Análises recentes de FBI Special Agent Dale Cooper

I just wrapped this game up, and I have a few praises and criticisms. Overall, despite these, I would still recommend this game. It has a lot of interesting elements, but there are a lot of unrefined issues that I wish would get resolved or overhauled. These are covered in the lists below:

Praises:
- Graphics are pretty good.
- The environmental effects are awesome as well as the way that certain attacks appear by mobs and bosses.
- The gameplay mechanisms are decent but the way they play out to create a sense of panic and intensity during certain events are great. You really get a sense of a dynamic environment while you're playing.
- The voice acting is decent, but could be a little less melodramatic, and I feel that comes down to the writing, not the performances. The voice performances are great.
- There are some really interesting features in this game that I loved. Looking into a mirror to see 'otherworldly' clues and items was awesome. I really liked some of the temporal effects. The idea of things changing as you looked away was stellar. The call back to that at the end level was a nice surprise and I got that achievement.
- The plot is very intriguing.
- There are definitely some nods and easter eggs that are entertaining. You can tell that the game had some solid inspirations.
- The fact that there are a variety of mechanisms to accomplish the goals of the levels does keep you interested throughout the game. The game doesn't rely on just button pushing or switch flipping. The variety of interactions and tools was definitely well thought out and implemented well.
- That the game focused heavily on mental health was good, but the melodrama of the portrayals was a juxtaposition of what I feel like design was trying to accomplish. It was somewhat distracting from the overall message, but I appreciate what they were trying to do.
- There is a *lot of lore* so if you're into games with that this is a huge plus.

Criticisms:
- By the time you get to the level with the shade/puddle, the 'avoid the boss' mechanism is tiring/exhausting. This is the #1 negative feature of this game.
- Level design doesn't have a lot of context clues to indicate where you're going. The levels rely on signs, rather than varied environmental design to let you know you're in a different area and that is one of the roughest things about them. It's easy to forget where you are even though there are maps available and the navigation is not very clear. There are some aspects of level design that are great and rewarding but boy, is there is a ton that is just a slog.
- I wish the plot had been fleshed out more. Overall it kind of follows a path but then it becomes a little muddled at the end with too many directions being established in the last acts.
- The gunplay is weak. If you're going to make enemies that have multiple health bars/defensive capabilities/aggressive strategies, you cannot handicap the player with poor shooting implementation. Don't make the game hard by just making weapon interaction not as good. If your goal is to create a panic state and force the player to be nervous in combat, make them at least fully capable of taking them down *if they're a good player*.
- If you are concerned that you've made a game that is too easy when you make weapons accurate, then rethink how you've programmed your AI to interact in combat. Maybe throw in more enemies so that if the player is too good they'll have the capability to feel only "slightly" overwhelmed instead of just straight up bullied because of weaker FPS mechanics.
- I am not sure if the fact that there are some unresolved plot elements is supposed to be a metanarrative or not. Did the game just wrap up early without exploring some of the themes established?

This is one of those games that has a strong art inspiration and is clearly trying to communicate something to the player. The character design is good, and the desire to tell a story is strong. The controls are a little lackluster, but I feel like you should still buy and play this game to support the team that developed it. I think that future projects of theirs could be more refined and end up being really solid titles.

Even though I'd give this game about a 75-80% (C+ to B-ish territory) I think it's still worth your time. I don't at all feel bad that I paid for this title, and you should give it a go as well. I think the developers deserve to be supported and the game is worth your while.

Wow.

The first thing I have to say about Paper Beast is that this is not a typical "game". Don't go into it with any expectations (which is hard to do in today's culture.)

There is a lot to love about Paper Beast. The game has a *ton of personality and character*, and at times can be very moving.

It's hard to say that there is one thing I absolutely love about it. All of the characters seem to have their own mindset and motivations, which I think is definitely one of the most immersive elements about it.

The physics and graphics implemented are also very excellent relative to the type of environment art style that is being shown within the game. Water looks like water, dirt looks like dirt, etc. Some of the effects are really stellar and enhance the style even more.

There was only one map where the goal was less clear than the others, and it dragged on until I eventually found a conclusion to it. (It was the one with the predators and the prey with the seeds, the gloomy map.)

I would definitely recommend people play Paper Beasts as one of their first VR experiences. There's a lot of storytelling that really transcends language and culture barriers in it and I think it can be widely appreciated by anyone with a VR setup.

Great work to the team who developed and produced it. You all did an awesome job.

10/10

I think the Black Mesa team did an excellent job of culturally replacing Valve's effort to make Half-Life 1. I remember playing Half-Life when it was new, and was really blown away overall, but I think playing Black Mesa was probably an overall better experience save for a few issues:

Criticisms:

- There were times when where I was supposed to go was not obvious, especially in office complex. HL1 by Valve also struggled with this issue so I can't really fault Black Mesa.
- I basically played Xen with the Hive gun. Like 90%, until I got toward the end and used the Gluon gun, and all of the weapons to defeat Nihilanth. In fact I used the hive gun pretty exclusively after picking it up.
- Some of the enemy AI was weak, especially the bullsquid. They got turned into a turret and were easy to deal with. I had seen this complaint before.

Praise:

- Everything looks and plays great!
- Xen was pretty satisfying in all, even for those who think it was long.
- Sound and music were really good, imo. Even the voices are good if you had never played HL before.

Faults:

- Game hard crashes sometimes, and it's difficult to get it back up and running again. These technical issues need to be fixed for longevity sake. To the Black Mesa team: please don't follow in Valve's footsteps.


If you want to get the modern experience of playing HL1, choose Black Mesa.

This is a very nice looking game, and it can really get tough! The mechanics are pretty great, and there are enough interesting paths to keep replay an option. Plus the secrets are pretty fun to find!

My only complaint is that sometimes the game is a little less clear on what you're supposed to do. I noticed that if you're stuck on a certain objective it will try to give you signs on what to do in order to clear that part of the level, but they're not immediately obvious with all of the action going on.

So far I've been playing this on normal, and it's not a walk in the park, which is kind of a relief. I can only imagine how hard it is on the next to levels up!

The two-tone graphics aesthetic is balanced well enough to not be an eyesore, which is great. The boss fights are a little hard if you're staying on top of what is going on, which can be a little challenging and there is some boss cheeze that happens but it reminds me a lot of old school consoles that had some limited AI, so I can appreciate it a bit.

I wish that the game had a little more dynamic ramping up in difficulty, but overall I'm pretty pleased with it. I did play the demo and I got the full version when it was on sale, and I think it's worth it for a good VR experience. The guns feel great, the action is engaging, and beating bosses does feel a bit satisfying to get through them.

When you get past the first two stages, the designs really become a lot of fun. I'm glad the developer is putting out new and more difficult content in order to keep the game fresh.

If you haven't played this game or don't own it, I highly recommend at least downloading the demo and getting it as a part of your library.

This was a great game, but way too short. I can get over the concept of having to buy two copies--that's not that big of a deal. I appreciate that they developed a way to play it cooperatively with no internet access required.

My partner and I played this game in two sessions. I really wish they had done so much more with the concept. There is a lot of places they could have gone with the story, but kind of held back and it feels that way.

I think it's worth the time and money to play it, but look at it from the perspective as it's something fun to do, and don't set your expectations higher than that, unless they add a lot more to the game and the story.

One thing that I thought was really clever in terms of puzzle design was that there was no need to search outside of the game for any information to solve the puzzles--it's entirely self contained. It really just comes down to how well you can communicate and work together to find a solution.

Overall I'd give it a 6 out of 10. I hope they decide to add more to it and flesh out the story some more, but even if they don't, give it a play.

Was finally able to play this today! (03/18/2022) I'm a little late to VR adoption, but this was an awesome game! Clearly the developers built the world to have a ton of potential and I wish there had been so much more.

I would like to see this fleshed out into a full experience and not just a one hour game. There's a lot of potential here and I hope the team is able to come back and make it something more significant.

Would absolutely recommend this as a title people should play as one of their first VR experiences. I do wish the code would be cleaned up so object manipulation was a little cleaner.

This should be one of your first PCVR experiences!

Although the gameplay is very, very short the design is incredible and super cute! It gives you an idea of what the platform is capable of from a design perspective. Not to mention that it runs great and looks equally as beautiful. It presents the concept of scale within VR amazingly.

Definitely give it a try--it's worth your time even if it's not an intense game experience.

I would love to see more from this studio.

This game was absolutely incredible and a real visual treat. It took me a little bit longer than everyone else (as I tried to explore everything) but all of the storytelling elements were not lost on me at all. It was a real treat to play through and the game definitely shows that the development team can flex their engine prowess.

The only times I got tripped up on the action were because of a few places where the clues on what to do next weren't immediately obvious to me, and I'm not sure if that's because of the game design or if it's just the way I play. VR experiences are radically different than mouse+keyboard ones.

If anyone is looking for system comparisons, I am running this on an ASUS ROG Strix G15 G513QY Laptop w/ 32 GB of RAM and an Oculus/Meta Quest 2 + Link cable setup, and it runs beautifully.

If you're just getting into VR and want an app to help set baseline expectations, I highly recommend this title.

This was actually really awesome despite it being so short. I kind of wondered if I was supposed to get the machine gun off of one of the zombie army guys, and I kind of regret not doing it again. It was really, really challenging to get through but I'm glad I did it.

If you're looking for something to establish a baseline for your first PCVR experience, definitely get this title.

For what it's worth, I'm running this game on an ASUS ROG Strix G15 G513QY laptop with 32 GB of RAM and an Oculus/Meta Quest 2 + link cable and it runs all on high just fine!